transemacabre | Dead Guys: In the beginning...

Marvelfic, PG.

In the beginning, there was everything and nothing, and he was nothing, and everything was him. There there was a great BANG and Entropy and Eternity cried out in one soundless scream, and suddenly he sparked into being again.

That nascent spark floated, unconscious, in the vast blackness, before soft murmurs began to call to it, from thousands of lightyears, across hundreds of universes. Slowly, irrevocably, it was pulled towards the murmurs, towards lines of force half-remembered, and then something deep inside whispered Nate Grey, and he knew once more who he was, and that knowledge was as terrible as eating of the forbidden fruit. He caught hold of a universe, not the universe of his birth but a comforting universe all the same, and another voice called out to him, I am your creator. I brought you back. Drawn by that voice and the comfort of the familiar, he awoke naked and shivering. Newly born.

Some kids found him in a field in the middle of Missouri, a naked man with skin raw and bruised, the only identifying marking a strange black tattoo. He was taken to a hospital and hooked up to a machine and fed through a tube for two weeks before his mind came back to him. He ripped the cord from the wall and said, "I'm Nate Grey," and teleported from the hospital, leaving nothing behind, not even a fingerprint. By now his skin was no longer raw, and a thick covering of stubble was beginning to grow atop his head. He found himself in the Catskills, dangling his feet in the coldest, purest stream, until once more he heard that voice calling to him. I am your creator. I brought you back. Find me. Rescue me.

The Spiral danced him along a thousand universes, a hundred realities, and something danced alongside him, and when he emerged from the portal there was a naked man in his arms, cold and smoking with power. Nate took him to the warehouse and gently coaxed his consciousness back from the brink, slowly, so slowly because anything faster would result in complete insanity. Then at last the naked man's eyes snapped open, and he gasped once, twice, and said, "I'm back."

They lived in that warehouse for weeks, alone and silent, unable to comprehend where they were or what they were. Nate fell back to old habits, telepathically diverting pizza delivery men to their warehouse, sending the poor fellows off with a little amnesia and less a pie. At first Genis wouldn't eat, so Nate had to pin him down and telekinetically force-feed him. He had not challenged the universe, danced across reality, to have his prize die of starvation. Genis roared at the indignity, and afterward reluctantly fed himself, glaring daggers at Nate all the while.

"If you hate me so much," Nate finally said to him one day, "why don't you leave? No one's stopping you."

"Where am I supposed to go?" Genis replied, his lip curling in disgust. "To space, to be manipulated by more cosmic entities? Back to superheroing, because that worked out so well last time? Or perhaps to the blackness of death? I wish. If you hadn't brought me back, I'd still be there."

"You brought me back first," Nate told him. "You destroyed and recreated the universe -- but you did it a little wrong. I was dead, but I returned so you could return. I think you had this all planned out."

Genis lobbed a slice of pizza at him at that, so he shut up.

Nate had been a shaman, but what's a shaman who has served his purpose? He had already died, his story was over, the last page written down. Was he then just another broken Nate Grey, like the ones from the infinite other realities, born to destroy and die? His mind stretched out across this world, touching minds, some familiar, some strange. None of them had a need of a Nate Grey. He was a redundancy, a cosmic joke, a relic best buried and forgotten.

And what of Genis, that science project turned superhero turned madman? Had he brought Nate back just to engender his own return from death? Nate had become the creator of his creator. Was he then responsible for Genis? Hell, he could barely take care of himself, squatting here in this warehouse, contemplating his navel, telepathically nudging away the curious who came snooping around. He looked down at the black tattoo on his chest, the one that kept his powers in check. He could feel his strength swelling within him, more power than ever before. Would he burn out this world? Or would he even get a chance, Crazy Genis over there would probably beat him to the world destruction.

One day, a cold rainy day that was as miserable as their foul moods, Nate walked over to where Genis was sleeping, curled on some tarps. He pushed at Genis' shoulder with his toe, and said, "C'mon. Let's get out of here."

"Why?" Genis mumbled, turning his face away. "What's the point?"

"We're going to go mad if we stay here."

"Huh," Genis laughed, a short bark. "A little late for that."